Cotton T
by yukiislikesnow
Summary: Kurt thinks back on an unusual obsession and how Sam was oddly okay with it. But maybe that's just because he didn't really know.


Title: Cotton T

Summary: Kurt thinks back on an unusual obsession and how Sam is kind of okay with it. But maybe that's because he doesn't really know.

Disclaimer: I do not own Glee. If I did Kurt would get far more action.

Pairing: Sam/Kurt

Rating: K

Warnings: None, it's fluffy really. I suppose it's a little airy but no naughtiness.

Kurt's POV

I had really thought Sam was gay. His hair was dyed, his lips were huge, and he was nice to me. Admittedly those aren't very good reasons to assume sexuality but I'm desperate and I had hoped. And he really is nice to me. He waves and smiles to me in the halls, helps me pick up my things after Karofsky throws them, and he stops to talk to me during lunch; in full view of other people. I'm not sure where he's from but it was bigger than Lima and homosexuality was more like an eye color than a sin. His perspective is nice and it gives me hope. When I talk to him I _know_ there are better places than Lima because he's been there and he's told me about it.

I'm not as crazy about him as I was about Finn, which is good for everyone involved. But where Finn was a bright flame, Sam is a long, deep simmer and it's just as good, if not better. I had hoped that time away would help, and that's what Dalton was, just time away. Just a vacation. Dad couldn't afford to keep me there and for all it's glamor Dalton is like a fish tank; and I felt like I was still in the plastic baggie waiting to adjust. My time there wasn't helping, not really. It was nice and Blaine is nice, but it's not really what I wanted. Far too boring. My relationship with Blaine is a non-issue, like he's the brother I always wanted and never got and that only makes me want Sam more.

I was trying to forget and move on because Sam was with Quinn and I'm going to be single until halfway through my freshman year in college, at least. But then I hear through Mercedes that Sam and Quinn are no more and neither of them are very sad about it. That makes my fantasies run wild. Then during winter break I get to decide if I want to go back to McKinley or spend another week at Dalton and it's a harder decision than it should be. Dalton is boring and filled with nice people, but people I don't _know_. And the fashion is non-existent. McKinley can be hell but my friends are there and New Directions. But Rachel's there too, but then again so is Sam so I can overlook her.

Then one day I'm off to the mall with Finn because apparently Rachel want to celebrate Christmas this once to be closer to Finn. He had no idea. When we get there it's a mess of shoppers and sales. After an hour of fruitless shopping I'm willing to buy Rachel an entire rack of tacky kitten sweaters if it means people will stop stepping on my shoes and tugging on my scarf. Then, there it is. Someone has their grubby hand on my scarf and gives it a 'hey you' tug. But when I turn around to hiss and bitch my words leave me.

Sam is standing there, still holding onto the end of my scarf, smiling like a doofus. He's holding a cinnamon sugar pretzel and wearing a ridiculously bright blue cookie monster t-shirt. I think I made a weird noise, something like a mouse or a kicked puppy, because he laughs and tugs on my scarf again before letting go. By then Finn had been eaten alive by shoppers and I had no idea where he was but Sam was saying 'hey' and 'I missed you' so Finn could deal with angry middle aged women on his own. I managed to say the same and I'm sure I smiled like an idiot while I did it but he didn't notice or didn't care. We talked for a few minutes and without a single thought to the consequences I assure him that I'd be back to McKinley the first Monday of new term. He seemed happy about it but I could have been projecting. I tend to do that.

I was going back to McKinley and it was for a boy...sort of, he was part of it. I made sure to be nonchalant when I mentioned our meeting to Finn, lest he think I was being obsessive. Eventually we, read I, found a reasonably priced camera/mp3 player that Finn could throw Rachel's way come Christmas. He then coerced me into mall foods and I found myself holding a cinnamon sugar pretzel with my smoothie instead of the Lo Mein I had intended. It was good, even if it was loaded with calories. And Finn, bless him, was not attentive enough to notice how I had scanned the parking lot for Sam's car when we left.

By the time we got home I had to start dinner and I decided on a casserole so I could have time to myself. The second I was sure the oven was set right and nothing else needed to be prepared I headed to the attic. To the immediate left inside was a pile of hastily stacked boxes. All of them were from my old room, now Finn's. I sorted through them the entire time dinner cooked, looking for a shirt. But not just any shirt, my old cookie monster shirt. My dad had bought it for me when I was eight and it swallowed me whole. But I wore it often and only retired it once I decided it was too much a crime to fashion to continue with.

Sam's shirt was obviously relatively new and more of a cotton/poly blend than mine, which was 100% worn, faded cotton. Cookie Monster's face had faded and parts of him had chipped away. It was over all duller and more worn than Sam's shirt, but still...That night, after my skin care routine, I slipped it on and smoothed my hands down my front. It was a bit snug, but more more so than any other shirt I wore, but it was almost too short. When I brought my hands up my stomach showed. Sam's shirt had been loose, baggie, bright. But this was just for me so I could pretend.

I could tug on this shirt and pretend that Sam had worn it thin and washed it endlessly and that once it had just shrunk. Because obviously he was terrible at laundry. Then he gave it to me, to remind me of him. It was pathetic and creepy in a way that I wasn't with Finn, but it made me feel better and it was a secret. My secret. No one had to know.

I went on that way for a while, tugging on the shirt whenever Sam went out of his way to talk with me, or whenever we missed each other completely the whole day. I was careful to only put it on at night before I went to bed. I wanted no questions after all. And every once in a while I'd see Sam in his own Cookie Monster shirt and I'd get this warm feeling in my stomach like this was somehow _our_ secret instead of just my own.

Soon enough it was basketball season and Sam came over, Puck too, to watch the games with Finn and I got to see more of him; in lots of different shirts and sometimes without one. Sam didn't seem to mind when I sat next to him during a game, which was a different type of weird; and I wondered vaguely if he's be okay with it if he knew my secret. But I was happy seeing him even if it meant a messy living room that I'd have to clean up and hearing Puck call me "Princess" in my own home. Once during a commercial break he'd asked me about Blaine, who he thought was my boyfriend, and I had been mortified and excited to explain the misconception. He smiled for the whole talk but I felt like the smile he started with was different with the one he ended with. But I wasn't sure. Then the game was back and our moment was over.

Eventually he asked me to tutor him in English and in exchange he taught me some Na'Vi. I didn't really care for it but he didn't care for English either so it was an okay trade. An added bonus, I got to spend extra time with him in my very own room. Then he started coming over to watch movies with me instead of just with Finn and at school I wasn't just waved to, I was stopped at, high-fived even. I didn't think much of it, well that's a lie, I thought _a lot_ about it but in the general not romantics. I figured he was just being friendly and I didn't want to push things, especially if there wasn't a _thing_ to begin with. But eventually Finn took notice and he started acting weird about it, weirder than he usually is. I prepared myself for another little 'talk' but it never came. Which makes me glad because he would've been right. Not knowing about the t-shirt obsession doesn't mean I'm not doing it.

Then one morning I'm half asleep when there's a knock at the door. I stumble towards it without thinking, without changing, and then I'm face to face with Sam Evans wearing my Cookie Monster shirt. He's wearing his too which is just as funny as it is sad and it woke me up properly real quick. Then he's smiling like a doofus, again, and stepping inside.

"Cookie Monster is awesome."

It's not the most eloquent comment ever made but he tugs at my shirt while he says it, right over my bellybutton, and I really couldn't care less.

"Yeah, he is."

-At this point I'd like to say that they get together and love each other and have man babies that watch Sesame Street. I would've loved to write it out but I think it would've derailed from the tone and taken far too long. But the implication is that they end up together.-


End file.
